The Daily Render

A Digital Scrapbook for the Past, Present, and Future

“Welcome to my room” – A YouTube video showing my outdoor photo installation for Fotoweek DC
|| 11/5/2009 || 3:23 pm || + Render A Comment || ||

This short video documents my temporary photo installation called “Welcome to my room.” for FotoweekDC 2009. The installation consists of about 24 random photographs that I had doubles of in my archives. They were stapled to the temporary wooden walkway on the west side of 14th Street near the intersection of T Street, NW, Washington, DC. The building for which the temporary walkway was constructed will become the chain department store called Room & Board. So welcome to my Room, I hope you are not Bored. Please add your own photos to the walkway and make the room ours. Send me photos of your additions.

UPDATE – I’m pleased to say that in the week since I installed the photographs, they’ve all been removed. Every other day I walked by the exhibit to see how many were remaining, which were mixing with the leaves on the sidewalk, and by yesterday they were all in the urban ether. The installation was never meant to be permanent nor really even a serious photographic exhibit, just an experiment, and since the photographs were all duplicate photos from 1992-2002, their sacrifice totally was worth it!

Timelapse YouTube Video of the Crowd at FiestaDC
|| 9/29/2009 || 4:48 pm || + Render A Comment || ||

On Sunday afternoon I filmed this timelapse video of the crowd of people at FiestaDC walking down Mount Pleasant Street in Northwest, Washington, DC. My good friend has an apartment right above the street which made for some awesome people watching (I think I called it “people watching caviar”). This elevated perspective allowed me to capture this unique footage of the festival participants. The audio in the video is from a separate recording of the same location played at normal speed. I did this to capture the sound of the festival without having to resort to some cheesy music playing over the timelapse video. As for the opening title sequence, I decided to play around with the fonts of the title for 15 frames each. I don’t really know why I did that except to add some random flair to the footage.

The Pentagon Timelapse Animated GIF (2001-2005)
|| 9/1/2009 || 5:00 pm || + Render A Comment || ||

Still frame from The Pentagon Timelapse Animated GIF featuring USGS aerial photography from 2005
Click the image above to watch the animation

Last night I was going through one of my external hard drives and rediscovered a cache of “old” satellite imagery. I rarely publish any entries that use satellite imagery due to copyright issues because, generally speaking, the company that owns the satellite also owns all the pixels and this prevents me from legally creating derivative works. Today, however, I decided to test the boundaries with this legacy satellite imagery of the Pentagon and feel that this creation is protected under the fair use doctrine of US copyright law. You can always contact GeoEye if you are interested in purchasing satellite imagery from the IKONOS satellite.

The Animated GIF below features 9 frames consisting of 7 satellite images from the IKONOS Satellite (2001-2002) and two public domain aerial photographs from the USGS (2002 & 2005). It begins with satellite imagery taken four days before 9/11/01 and ends with a USGS aerial photograph taken in September 2005. The frames in between show the aftermath and the subsequent rebuilding of the Pentagon. I did my best to line up the building in my image editing program, but it’s not 100% perfect due to the angle in which some of the imagery was taken.

I have chosen to place the The Pentagon Timelapse Animated GIF “below the fold” so that visitors to the front page of this website are not downloading the somewhat large file. Please be patient while it downloads……

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Photographs of a Major Laser in the Hallway [Timelapse Laser Painting]
|| 8/23/2009 || 11:15 pm || 1 Comment Rendered || ||

Photographs of a red & green laser in my friend's apartment in the Adams Morgan neighborhood of Washington, DC

Saturday night I was on my way over to a friend’s 1990’s-themed house party and when I got to the house I realized that I had left my bicycle lock at my home. Perturbed, I hopped back on my bicycle, pedaled home as fast as I could, and when I arrived at my house, I received a text message from a different friend asking me to bring over his laser that he’d left at my house the previous night. I weighed my options and decided to bring the laser to my friend’s apartment in Adams Morgan. After I arrived, we decided the best place to shoot the laser in the apartment was down the length of his long hallway. I noticed that there was a tripod in the kitchen, so I decided to get out my small camera and take some photographs of this major laser in the hallway.

The following photographs were taken using my Canon SD750 and the aforementioned tripod and laser using long exposure settings to capture the geometric designs the laser created:

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Timelapse YouTube Video of the 4th of July Fireworks in Washington, DC
|| 7/5/2009 || 7:11 pm || + Render A Comment || ||

Every 4th of July for the last 5 years I’ve watched the massive firework display on the National Mall from a rooftop in the Washington, DC area. This year I finally decided to see the display from my rooftop and make a video of it. The music is the Washington Post March by John Philip Sousa and performed by the United States Marine Band. One of my favorite aspects of being on a rooftop in DC on the 4th of July is watching everyone shoot their own fireworks. You can see them exploding in every direction!

Before the fireworks, I attended my friend’s second annual “Jerk Off” BBQ competition in Rock Creek Park. And to continue my other 4th of July tradition, I rode around the city with my Adbusters Corporate flag attached to a large flagpole attached to my backpack. Like in the years past, people would still applaud when they see it, most not knowing there was a subtle protest waving before their eyes. Next to being on rooftop, waving this flag is my second favorite 4th of July tradition…

YouTube Video: “A Fly on the Wall at Artomatic”
|| 6/15/2009 || 4:36 pm || Comments Off on YouTube Video: “A Fly on the Wall at Artomatic” || ||

On Saturday June 13th, 2009, I attended the Artomatic “Meet The Artist Night.” As an experiment, I decided to place my digital camera on my exhibit wall. This time-lapse video documents what it would be like to be a fly on the wall at my Artomatic 2009 exhibit.

About midway through the video, I remove the camera from the wall and a friend takes a photo of me with a couple friends and then I place the camera back on the wall for the remainder of the filming.

Music used in the video is Azul (Gianma’s Drum and Bass Remix) by Natalia Clavier from her El Arbol EP (2008).

You can also view a somewhat better quality version of the video on Facebook.

“A Haircut One Year In The Making” – A time-lapse YouTube video of my long-awaited haircut
|| 3/25/2009 || 12:27 pm || + Render A Comment || ||

After growing my hair out for the last year, I decided to film the long-awaited haircut in my living room using my digital camera’s time-lapse recording function. While the haircut was taking place a couple of my housemates come home and watch the haircut unaware that there was a camera recording in the background.

The video gratuitously starts out with a couple photos I took of myself from July of 2008 until March of 2009 then transitions to the footage my Canon SD750 recorded using the one frame per second time-lapse feature. I would have included more photos from June of 2008 to March of 2008, but I couldn’t find any photos on my hard drive.

Anyways, I doubt I’ll grow my hair out like this again for awhile, but honestly, I enjoyed having it.
Up next: the sideburns!

MUSIC: Concerto for Flute and Orchestra in F Major by Antonio Vivaldi
Performed by the Gardner Chamber Orchestra. Audio directed by flutist Paula Robison.
Audio courtesy of Archive.org

Artwork Note: On the wall, behind me to my left, is my map “Washington Monument Lenz”

Related YouTube Entries:

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Timelapse Photography of the Apotheosis of Saint Louis and the exterior of the Saint Louis Art Museum
|| 12/23/2008 || 6:00 pm || Comments Off on Timelapse Photography of the Apotheosis of Saint Louis and the exterior of the Saint Louis Art Museum || ||

Timelapse photography of the Apotheosis of Saint Louis by Nikolas Schiller

After publishing the Saint Louis Art Museum Quilt earlier today, I was reminded of a series of photographs that I had taken when I had visited the museum last. It was New Years eve 2003 and Forest Park was open to highlight the start of the bicentennial anniversary of the Louisiana Purchase and the centennial anniversary of 1904 World’s Fair. While I didn’t know it at the time, the statue that I was taking photographs of was the Apotheosis of St. Louis.

According to the City of Saint Louis website:

“Apotheosis of St. Louis,” the statue of Saint Louis, King Louis IX of France, was the original symbol of the City of St. Louis.

The original plaster model of this statue was cast in 1903 by Charles H.Niehaus and stood at the main entrance to the 1904 World’s Fair, where the History Museum now is located.

The Louisiana Purchase Exposition Company decided to have the sculpture cast in bronze and presented to the City of St. Louis as part of the restoration of Forest Park after the fair. They approached Niehaus, who offered to cast it in bronze for $90,000, a price so high that the project appeared to be over. A local firm, W. R. Hodges, proposed to complete the project for $37,500.

The commission accepted Hodge’s offer and the statue was replicated but Niehaus protested and sued for ownership rights. Seven months after the dedication of the gift, Niehaus was awarded $3,000 in payment and the stipulation that the pedestal be inscribed “designed by C. H. Niehaus.”

The statue was unveiled Oct. 4, 1906. It is inscribed on the north base, “Presented to the City of St. Louis by the Louisiana Purchase Exposition in commemoration of the Universal Exposition of 1904 held on this site.”

Timelapse photography of the exterior of the Saint Louis Art Museum by Nikolas Schiller

Below are the rest of the photographs I took on 12/31/03 using my old Canon S200 and a mini-tripod stand:

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Time-Lapse Video of the Conjunction of Venus, Jupiter, and a Crescent Moon in Washington, DC
|| 12/2/2008 || 3:26 pm || Comments Off on Time-Lapse Video of the Conjunction of Venus, Jupiter, and a Crescent Moon in Washington, DC || ||

Before I took the photographs last night I first recorded this timelapse video. The video consists of hundreds of frames taken exactly two seconds apart using my Canon SD750 digital camera mounted on my tripod. I started recording the video around dusk before I could see Jupiter through the twilight and let it record until the planets were out of frame. The music is Transit of Venus by John Phillip Sousa (1893) and performed by the Virginia Grand Military Band (2003). I’ve used this music before when filming other planets and it’s pretty much become my de-facto music for all my astronomy related videos.

Related Venus Entries:

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Astrophotography of the conjunction of the Crescent Moon, Venus, and Jupiter
|| 12/1/2008 || 10:02 pm || Comments Off on Astrophotography of the conjunction of the Crescent Moon, Venus, and Jupiter || ||

Astrophotography from my back deck showing the conjunction of the Venus, Jupiter, and the Crescent Moon

This evening I took a series of photographs of what I feel to be one of the most beautiful planetary alignments I’ve seen in my life. Below are the rest of the photographs and tomorrow I’ll post the timelapse video I recorded of the planet’s slow transit through the night sky.

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Nikolas Schiller is a second-class American citizen living in America's last colony, Washington, DC. This blog is my on-line repository of what I have created or found on-line since May of 2004. If you have any questions or comments, please contact: